My personal tradition Blog

One family tradition that I have personally taken part in is Sabbath lunch. Sabbath known to be observed by the Jews but I am Seventh - day Adventist and we also observe the Sabbath. Being that my family is West- Indian we have a custom where we have a big lunch in the middle of the day and don’t eat any other meal for the rest of the day other than a snack. This tradition has been practiced every Saturday evening since I can remember. What we do is that after the church service is over and we are finished greeting our fellow brethren we go home, stay at church or go to another’s house for fellowship. Fellowship is what we call Sabbath lunch. In the islands usually this would take place, if not some ones house, on a beach out outside. In the states this happens, or came into being because a lot of people would end up being at church all day. After the service is done church is not. There are things like handing out tracks, pathfindering (sort of like an Adventist Boy Scout and Girl Scouts) and bible study. Then in the afternoon there is Adventist youth where it is like church for the youth. So basically people did not want to go home and come back all the time. After a while when churches got too big then it would spread to people’s homes. People will cook large meals and even when times were hard everyone will pitch in when times are rough there seems to be enough for everyone to be fed.
Some foods that are served are mostly vegetarian food (we are usually grown up eating this food because at church this is mostly what is served). But we also prepare meat occasionally. We also have things like rice and peas, the “special” juice and other cultural foods. When it’s a large setting and for visitors we share out food but people are always allowed for seconds and to share for themselves. During this eating time we catch up on the week, tell stories about our families, talk about the service or things that happened in Sabbath school that we did not finish discussing and basically talk about whatever is on our minds or bothering us.
This custom has gone on for years and I believe it will go on for years to come. It has toned down a little because at church they now do fellowship every second Sabbath, and the times are getting cold so people do not really come back to church for Adventist Youth because of personal reasons but people are still going over each other’s house and sharing fellowship with each other. I have always enjoyed this tradition and I hope to pass this one to my children also.